Employee Spotlight: Sarah Brichetto

Sarah Brichetto wasn’t looking for a job when she heard about an opening at Green Coast in early 2015. Working at Ernst and Young, Brichetto, who had a one-year-old daughter at the time, had adjusted to corporate life as an auditor, which included long hours and occasional travel.

The work was challenging, and yet she didn’t feel particularly fulfilled.

“After I interviewed at Green Coast, and the more I learned about the company, it just made a lot of sense for me.” Brichetto recalls. “I didn’t know it at the time, but I also wanted to make a difference. That was the part that felt lacking before. That was why I didn’t feel fulfilled.”

Brichetto embraced her new role as Green Coast’s finance manager, and immediately felt part of a team. No longer was she checking others’ work; now she taking an active role with all things accounting: from helping design and monitor project budgets, to cash management, preparing cash flow models, preparing financial reports for lenders and investors and paying the bills.

“If it has to do with money, I’ve had my hand in it,” Brichetto says.

Since coming onboard, Brichetto has watched Green Coast nearly double in size in terms of employees, projects and revenue has also significantly increased. It’s been a learning experience with Brichetto acquiring new expertise in tax credits and the associated cost certification work, and managing investor funds. With these new skills come rewards such as seeing Green Coast’s projects come to fruition.

“When I joined Green Coast in 2015, we owned the Pythian Building, but that was about it for the project,” Brichetto says. “Now it’s been almost completely renovated, and offers or will soon offer housing for our residents, jobs for our community and commerce for our local economy.”

Brichetto hasn’t forgotten her previous work, and when she’s preparing financial schedules or investor reports, she’s doing it with the eye of an auditor. At the same time, however, she now sees those statements as more than just checking off boxes.

•I really believe in the triple bottom line of people, planet and profit,” Brichetto says. “When I say to people that I work for a real estate development company, I get to add, ‘we’re not your typical real estate development company.’”